Page 2 of The Fire We Make

“My father couldn’t come get me?” she asked, looking at Darnell through the rearview mirror.

Darnell avoided her eyes. “He had prior engagements, ma’am, but he said he’ll meet you at the estate once he’s finished,” he answered as they pulled onto the highway that would carry out of the middle of nowhere and back to Houston.

Joy sighed, leaning her head back against the seat. Her father was still angry with her and she understood. She was sure her episode had foiled their plans and derailed their progress, but she was back and ready to make it up to him.

“Actually, you can take me to my father,” Joy replied. As his second in command, if her father was working, then she needed to be with him.

Darnell shifted uncomfortably. “Um… ma’am, I don’t think… I was given strict instructions to⁠—.”

The sight of Joy’s quirked brow in the mirror halted his words. “Yes, ma’am.”

Pleased, Joy relaxed in the backseat, watching the open fields and trees transform into the Houston skyline.

Joy didn’t wait for Darnell to open the door for her when they pulled around to the back of the Thibodeaux Trucking building.

The sun was setting, but the lot bustled with activity. All around her, men were loading and unloading boxes from trucks. Some of them likely held construction materials or produce. The majority, though, contained drugs and guns that would be distributed to the various crews working under the Thibodeaux family in the state of Texas.

Joy smiled. Pride bubbled in her chest watching the organization she helped build operate like a well-oiled machine.

With Darnell following closely behind, she strutted across the loading dock and through the double doors that led to the offices.

The men at the door gave her a wide berth as she breezed past them. Some nodded, welcoming her back, and others avoided eye contact altogether.

It seemed word had gotten around about the reason for her absence.

Good, she thought.

Joy didn’t mind being feared. In fact, she preferred it. Being a young woman in the underworld, sometimes fear was the only language the men around her understood, and she spoke it fluently.

She pushed through the long hall leading to her father’s office. She rapped on the door twice. After a few moments of waiting, she knocked again, this time more forcefully and repetitively. The door swung open and Byron Thibodeaux stood there with a scowl on his face that didn’t soften at the sight of his baby girl. Alarm flickered in his gaze, but it was gone just as fast as it came.

“Princess,” he said, holding on to the door. “What are you doing here?”

“Hello to you too, Daddy. Long time, no see,” Joy replied.

It had been almost an entire year since they’d laid eyes on each other. The father-daughter duo stood in the doorway, assessing the other.

Joy was the spitting image of her father, inside and out. They shared the same deep walnut colored skin, chocolate brown upturned eyes, round button nose, and full lips.

They had identical ruthlessness and thirst for power, with twin tempers that were as lethal as a bullet once ignited. She was his mini-me in every way that didn’t require testosterone. That fact used to bring Joy comfort. Knowing that she was exactly like her hero and favorite person in the world once made her feel exceptional.

Now, with the weight of her diagnosis standing between them, Joy could see that her father no longer saw her as a perfect reflection of him but a smudge on his self-portrait.

“Can I come in or…?” Joy asked. She didn’t wait for his answer before slipping through the crack in the door. Her heels clicked against the hardwood flooring as she strolled deeper into the office.

It took her eyes a moment to adjust to the dim lighting hazy with smoke, but when they did, they immediately found Byron’s associates, all of them seated around the small conference table on the other side of the room. “Damn, y’all couldn’t have waited an hour for me?” she asked, as it became clear to her that she’d stumbled upon a meeting she hadn’t been privy to. Seven sets of eyes shifted nervously amongst each other as her presence became known.

“Good afternoon,” she greeted the silent room, prompting scattered mumbled responses as she moved closer. She assessed the room with keen eyes that likened her to a shark assessing and circling its prey.

Joy’s eyes focused on the seat beside her father — her seat — occupied by Byron’s advisor, Cleve.

“Cleveland.”

He met Joy’s hard eyes with a smirk that she returned with a glower. It was no surprise he had been serving as Byron’s right hand in her absence, but Joy thought he looked way too fucking comfortable in her spot.

“Joy.”

“Why the fuck are you in my seat?”